Hopefully the funding shortfall means they'll only build to Dulles. Do we really need a station at Rt. 772?

I agree with this. I strongly support Phase I's building the Silver line to Tysons and Reston and I support extending metro to Dulles but I question the value of the additional stations in Loudoun County. There are a significant number of people who live in Leesburg and eastern Loudoun County who commute to jobs in the Dulles corridor and Tysons. Unless, however, Loudoun plans significant (at least hundreds of millions of dollars) development immediately around the stations, these additional stations should not be built past Dulles. Billions of dollars should not be spent to further extend the Silver line and build stations is only low-density suburban town centers or Park & Ride lots are going to be built at the stations.

It is not going to happen but I would like to see the Silver line end at Dulles and build a light rail route from Dulles down Route 28 to I-66 instead. Route 28 has a fairly dense concentration of jobs and the Air & Space museum.

At least one of the stations towards the end of the line will end up being a major Park & Ride in order to accommodate all those people living in low-density sprawl past the end of the line -- particularly because here, unlike at ORD or SFO, there's no commuter rail to serve that market. I'm sure MWAA would be happy to charge commuters $17 a day at Dulles, but I doubt that would fly.

The Loudoun stations are proposed to have parking for 6,000 cars between them, comparable to the 5,000 parking spaces at Vienna or Franconia. The last station before Dulles & Loudoun is at Innovation/Coppermine, where 2,000 spaces are included in Dulles Station on the south side (and none at the future CIT expansion) -- but where there's no easy on/off from either the DTR or Sully. That leaves Herndon/Monroe, which is a fine facility but (a) not as large and (b) seven miles from Route 772, or 10+ miles from Ashburn, etc.

"A third Capital Bikeshare station opened on the National Mall Monday, joining two other stations in the nation's front yard that quickly have become some of Washington's most popular bikesharing spots.

On Saturday, the first Mall stations became the busiest pickup spots of the distinctive red bicycles across the system, with the Martin Luther King Memorial station logging 200 originating trips and the Washington Monument station having 176, project manager Josh Moskowitz said. Since opening just over two weeks ago, they have scored near or in the top 10, he added.

Officials have been pleased with the success of the first two Mall stations, especially because enough riders have picked up and dropped off the bikes to avoid having staff drive many bikes to the stations as replacements. "They've tended to rebalance quite well," Moskowitz said..."

Planners make changes to Purple Line in Riverdale Park (Washington Post)

Planners make changes to Purple Line in Riverdale Park

By Katherine Shaver
April 11, 2012
Washington Post

"Purple Line trains would run down the middle of Kenilworth Avenue in Riverdale Park rather than along the side, one of several changes Maryland transit planners say they have made to the proposed light rail line to spare businesses in the area.

State transit planners said they also were able to save those commercial buildings along Kenilworth because they persuaded state highway planners to abandon plans to eventually widen the street. That widening is no longer necessary based on updated traffic projections for the area, which haven’t kept pace with forecasts, transit planners said.

Michael Madden, the Maryland Transit Administration’s manager on the Purple Line study, said he expects local business owners and residents will be pleased to hear of the changes, which MTA officials plan to explain in more detail at a community meeting Thursday. Six of the nine commercial buildings initially slated to be torn down, including a church and bowling alley, would now be spared, Madden said..."

I don't know why American transit agencies have uniformly rejected such trains while European and Asian agencies have embraced them.

I know in Chicago, 8-car trains are run during the day and then severed into two 4-car trains for nighttime service. CTA's cars are set up in married pairs, though, so odd numbers of cars are not possible. It's always made eminent sense to me to set up the train with flexible connectors to join each married pair.

Its more practical for operations that can satisfactorily adjust capacity purely on frequency (which includes most metros outside the US). When you're cutting and combining train consists frequently between time periods, you'll add a lot of extra yard labor that a standard coupling mechanism otherwise handles. WMATA, like CTA, operates a range of 4/6/8 car trains on different lines at different times.

Also, I forget where, but I've definitely seen at least one study that found the increase in capacity was almost negligible, since in crowded conditions people still tried to stay near the doors. The end of a car or an articulated joint are equally undesirable.

Man, WMATA gets those awesome LED signs and the best CTA can doafford is a light-up map from a 3rd-grade science fair project?

Fixed it. Semi-seriously though, it's not exactly that it would be too expensive if spec-ing new cars now (recall WMATA spec'd these cars recently in 2008), it's more to do with the additional costs of an assembly line cut-in and retrofit mid-production. It could still happen, though.

Side note, I assume only the prototype car is built in Japan, since final assembly has to be domestic to comply with Buy America?

The increase in capacity isn't even the largest advantage to open interior trains to me. The largest advantage is to be able to walk to less crowded parts of the train, and to be able to make your way to the other end of the train while it's still in motion instead of wasting 60-90 seconds after you get off the train.

The increase in capacity isn't even the largest advantage to open interior trains to me. The largest advantage is to be able to walk to less crowded parts of the train, and to be able to make your way to the other end of the train while it's still in motion instead of wasting 60-90 seconds after you get off the train.

That's why I always try to position myself for where I'm going. For example, when I take the red line in the morning to Gallery Place to switch to the yellow line, I know it's best to be in the first car because it lines up perfectly with the walkway down to the lower level yellow/green line platforms. Meanwhile in the afternoon I always try to be in the 2nd car from the front on the yellow line because it lines up with the escalators up to the red line platform at Gallery Place. And once I'm there, I usually try to make my way down to the middle or forward door of the 3rd car from the front because it lines up with the Dupont north escalators to exit (I used to exit at Dupont South and would always try to board the 6th car on the red line, but Dupont South is frustratingly closed until this fall).

That's why I always try to position myself for where I'm going. For example, when I take the red line in the morning to Gallery Place to switch to the yellow line, I know it's best to be in the first car because it lines up perfectly with the walkway down to the lower level yellow/green line platforms. Meanwhile in the afternoon I always try to be in the 2nd car from the front on the yellow line because it lines up with the escalators up to the red line platform at Gallery Place. And once I'm there, I usually try to make my way down to the middle or forward door of the 3rd car from the front because it lines up with the Dupont north escalators to exit (I used to exit at Dupont South and would always try to board the 6th car on the red line, but Dupont South is frustratingly closed until this fall).

I try to do the same, but as my girlfriend said, many of the people walk on the platform like they are strolling through a field of daisies. Similarly, the briefcases or bags with the wheels on them have got to go. They are not at all compatible with efficient movement on the platforms. Unless you're traveling over a hundred miles, leave these things at home.

Regarding the escalators, there has been a discussion before about this but why is it taking nine months (WMATA-speak for one and a half years) to replace three escalators? I understand the complexity of this, but surely other countries could replace a couple of escalators in just a few months.

I try to do the same, but as my girlfriend said, many of the people walk on the platform like they are strolling through a field of daisies. Similarly, the briefcases or bags with the wheels on them have got to go. They are not at all compatible with efficient movement on the platforms. Unless you're traveling over a hundred miles, leave these things at home.

Of all the stations I've used on Metro, Gallery Place is by far my least favorite. The terrible T-shaped design leads to inefficient movements of passengers since anyone transferring from the red to yellow/green must fight through the mass of people transferring from the yellow/green to red. Instead of having half from one end and half from the other end taking their own escalators up/down or meeting in the middle to take the escalators up/down (as would be the case in a X or cross shaped station), you instead have a mass of humanity, all moving at different paces along narrow platforms, in opposing directions. The afternoon rush at Gallery Place drives me crazy.

Of all the stations I've used on Metro, Gallery Place is by far my least favorite. The terrible T-shaped design leads to inefficient movements of passengers since anyone transferring from the red to yellow/green must fight through the mass of people transferring from the yellow/green to red. Instead of having half from one end and half from the other end taking their own escalators up/down or meeting in the middle to take the escalators up/down (as would be the case in a X or cross shaped station), you instead have a mass of humanity, all moving at different paces along narrow platforms, in opposing directions. The afternoon rush at Gallery Place drives me crazy.

I was in DC last weekend. Don't the L'Enfant Plaza and Metro Center Stations have the same issues? Metro Center is pretty ugly during the afternoon rush itself.

That's why I always try to position myself for where I'm going. For example, when I take the red line in the morning to Gallery Place to switch to the yellow line, I know it's best to be in the first car because it lines up perfectly with the walkway down to the lower level yellow/green line platforms. Meanwhile in the afternoon I always try to be in the 2nd car from the front on the yellow line because it lines up with the escalators up to the red line platform at Gallery Place. And once I'm there, I usually try to make my way down to the middle or forward door of the 3rd car from the front because it lines up with the Dupont north escalators to exit (I used to exit at Dupont South and would always try to board the 6th car on the red line, but Dupont South is frustratingly closed until this fall).

I do too, but sometimes the train is arrives at the platform the same time as me, so I'm not going to walk to where I want to get off unless the train is so crowded that I would wait for the next train anyway. For example, the entrance next to my apartment leads to the west end of the platform. If I get to the platform at the same time as the train (which happens often as it runs every 2-3 minutes peak), and I want to exit at the east end of the platform where I get off, I'll be able to traverse the length of the train while aboard once they start running trains on this line.

There are several advantages, that is just one. Open gangway trains are just far superior from a rider's perspective, so I'm surprised they're not going with them now if they're switching trains anyways. If not now, when will they switch over to open gangways? This would seem like the perfect opportunity.